His Dark Materials
With the usual holiday hullabaloo over I finally got around to finishing off Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy. All said I really enjoyed it. The characters are quite memorable with that nice combination of interesting and realistic, which can be hard to come by in fantasy novels.
The biggest complaint I have comes from my friend John, an avid reader of fantasy and sci-fi who as a physicist spends his days smashing atoms, measuring gravity waves, and searching for invisible clouds high in the stratosphere. One of his particular dislikes in literature is when someone tries to over-explain the science behind something when science doesn’t quite mesh up with the explanation, for instance the lodestone resonators in the HDM trilogy. I didn’t find it such a bother, but we all have things that bug the shit out of us. Hell…anyone who has talked to me long enough knows how much I love to fly off the handle about the endangered status of the adverb, especially in the media.
Beyond that most people view the occasional smack at religion with a grain of salt, especially since the particular comments are true of the Church at various times in its history. I don’t think it should be any more of a turn off than my having to read CS Lewis talking about how rotten little girls become when they grow up in true to life bible-thumper form.
Oh yeah, and as far as the movie for The Golden Compass goes according to WorldwideBoxoffice.com it came in at about #13 for revenue last year and has earned $249.8 million. Since the budget for the movie came in around $200 million, it looks like we’ll get to see the other two made. Funny how many people keep talking about how the movie flopped when the numbers tell a vastly different story. I guess their own agendas are showing.
Hmmm…I wonder if the Atheist Agenda fits in with the Liberal Agenda or the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.